Previous Findings of Yod Studies
a) Summaries of Studies
Amos (2007:27) states that from previous East Anglian studies of the (ju) variable,
overall the rate of yod-dropping is social class sensitive, as would be expected as it is
a more vernacular speech form. Also that yod-dropping is a receding feature which
is decreasing. Brief summaries of some relevant findings are noted below:

Trudgill Norwich Study (1974)
60 speakers were randomly selected via electoral registers and categorised into 5
social class groups. The categories were based on a social class index formed from
information relating to occupation, income, education, housing, locality and father’s
occupation. Data was collected using a variety of methods and categorised
according to speech style: Word list (WL), reading passage (RPS), formal (FS), and
casual (CS). The results can be seen in chart form below:
Chart 1 Trudgill’s Analysis of Yod-dropping by Social Class and Speech Style
(1974:102)
There is a distinct class stratification illustrated here with middle class working and
lower middle class being the exception in formal and casual styles.

Spurling’s Ipswich Study (2004)
Data was collected from 12 participants to analyse casual speech style, with 6 males
and 6 female speakers. As well as this, Spurling used 18 participants spanning 3 age
groups for a reading list analysis. She found that in casual speech, there was
categorical /j/ deletion in the older speakers and a 22% rate of yod-dropping in the
younger age group with younger female speakers having the lowest rate. In the
reading list analysis a similar pattern emerged for age. However there were some
gender differences in that males across all age groups produced more yodfull tokens
than their female counterparts. In terms of linguistic environment, Spurling found
that where the preceding consonant was /t/ or /d/ then Ipswich speakers never
produced [ju], favouring either yodless [u] or coalesced [ʧ] or [ʤ] variants realised
as [ʧu] and [ʤu] respectively.

Amos and Green’s Study of Mersea Island (2006)
Informal interviews were conducted with 16 speakers. The results show that
“compared to Ipswich, yod-dropping is a much less robust as a dialect feature”
(Amos 2007:33). Older female speakers had a yod-dropping rate of 69% and males
57%. In the younger age group males had a 14% rate whilst females only deleted /j/
2% of the time. Palatisation within the younger age group was extremely common
(100% of [ʤ] and 90% of [ʧ] with preceding /d/ and /t/ respectively) however the
preference was for the use of the affricate + /ju/ and thus was realised as [ʤju] and
[ʧju]. They found that in the older group palatisation with post consonantal /t/ was
preferred to any other variant whilst post consonantal /d/ used the [ʤ] variant only
12% of the time preferring to yod-drop (72%).
a) Ranking Scales
A number of theorists have produced such scales, ranking the likelihood of yoddropping in particular environments depending on the preceding consonant. These
are listed below:
Fig ii) Trudgills Ranking of Preceding Consonants (1974:102)
Most Likely
Least Likely
/s/>/n/>/d/>//t/>/v/>/f/>/m/>/b/>/p/>/k/
Fig iii) Bailey’s Ranking of Preceding Consonants (1977):
Most Likely
Least Likely
/r,l/>/s,z.ɵ/>/n,t,d/>//t/>/v/>/v,f,p,m/
Fig iv) Spurling’s Ranking of Preceding Consonants (2004)
In casual speech style:
b, s, h > n > d > v > f > k > t
/j/ less frequent
/j/ more frequent
In reading passage style:
n > s > z, h > m, f > b, d > t > p > v > k > g
/j/ less frequent
/j/ more frequent
Fig v) Amos’ Ranking of Preceding Consonants (2006)
ɵ > st > s > b, ʃ > f > n > v > h > p > m > k > l > g
/j/ less frequent
/j/ more frequent
Bauer (1994:109) found that /ju/ was less stable following /r/, /s/, /ɵ/ and /l/ than it
was following /n/, /t/, and /d/.
b) Other Linguistic Environments
Bailey (1977) noted that yod-dropping is more frequent in monosyllabic words than
polysyllabic ones; however Amos, Britain and Spurling did not find this to be
significant in their work on yod-dropping in the East Anglian periphery (2008). Amos
and Green (2006) concurred with Wells (1982) in finding that yod-dropping is less
likely in unstressed syllables.
Finally, Amos, Britain and Spurling (2008) found that a significant factor in
influencing yod-dropping was in the nature of the syllable. They found that whether
the syllable was open or closed influenced the rate of yod-dropping.